Daily political headlines compete with each other in
this hotly contest election year. It seems that there is no end to
news, no end to the twists and turns in the presidential campaigns.

For insights, for fascinating takes, for the stories
behind the headlines - there is "Fleeced" by Dick Morris and Eileen
McGann (Harper, 26.95, 337 pages) and "The War Within" by Bob
Woodward (Simon & Schuster, $32.00, 487 pages) and "The Dark Side"
by Jane Mayer (Doubleday, $27.50, 392 pages).

"Fleeced" has all kinds of conscious raising info on
Obama, the Clintons, Hugo Chavez, consumers getting gouged on credit
card fees, the Dubai factor and the oppressive pressure on the
economy. A lot of what this timely tome contains is shocking, worth
reacting to and knowing about. The book begins this way: "will
explain a disastrous array of fleeces that are conspiring to rob the
American people of their money, their security, and their way of
life." If that is not enough to catch anyone's attention! A must
read.

Another "Must Read" is "The War Within," a
scrupulously researched work written with intelligence and passion
and filled with first hand accounts of the war in Iraq from the
middle of 2006 to mid-2008. Leadership, questions of morality,
secrecy, governmental behavior all intermingle. Bush bashing has
been in vogue for a long time now. To read this book is to realize
no amount of denigration of him is enough. A masterpiece.

"Einstein's Rabbi: A Tale of Science and the Soul" by
Michael M. Cohen Shires Press, Available at Northshire Bookstore,
4869 Main Street, Manchester Center, VT 05255 is a novella, which
appropriately came our way during the season of Selichot, is a
pilgrimage of self discovery on the part of a young man from a
secular family in suburban New Jersey who discovers his Jewish soul
via a spontaneous friendship with a neighborhood rabbi who was, for
many years, a close confidante of Albert Einstein's. But the story
is merely a vehicle for broad philosophical ruminations, historical
explications, and spiritual insights into the kaleidoscope of
Judaism as the young man becomes increasingly drawn to Jewish life
under the informal tutelage of his elderly friend who frequently
(and accurately) quotes the famed physicist and, at the same time,
encourages his acolyte to ponder his own comments such as "Never
confuse belief in God with an understanding of who or what God is."
The meeting of science and religion, the nature of God, the
continued relevance of Jewish observance are but some of the
profound subjects which emerge in conversations that make up a good
portion of this deceptively simple but actually deep and heuristic
book.

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About the Authors: Myrna Katz Frommer and Harvey Frommer are a wife and husband
team who successfully bridge the worlds of popular culture and traditional
scholarship. Co-authors of the critically acclaimed interactive oral histories
It Happened in the Catskills, It Happened in Brooklyn, Growing Up Jewish in
America, It Happened on Broadway, It Happened in Manhattan, It Happened in
Miami. They teach what they practice as professors at Dartmouth College.

They are also travel writers who specialize in luxury properties and fine dining
as well as cultural history and Jewish history and heritage in the United
States, Europe, and the Caribbean. More
about these authors.